


Jus Drein, Jus Daun

by eternaleponine



Series: The 100 Clexa Reunion [8]
Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-08
Updated: 2016-01-08
Packaged: 2018-05-12 12:01:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,685
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5665366
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eternaleponine/pseuds/eternaleponine
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Clarke begins to integrate into Grounder society, only to have an unexpected visitor come to try and drag her back.</p>
<p>Follows <a href="http://archiveofourown.org/works/5443412">Polis</a>.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Jus Drein, Jus Daun

One day turned to two, turned to three, turned to a week. They fell into a routine, waking up in the morning and dressing, going to breakfast, and then going out into Polis. Lexa spoke to Clarke almost entirely in her own language, translating only when asked, and Clarke's pride got in the way of her asking more than she probably should have let it. She stumbled over her words sometimes, and Lexa just corrected her gently, although sometimes Clarke was sure that she was fighting back laughter at the mistakes that Clarke made. 

They weren't together all of the time, but more often than not, she was at Lexa's side, or just behind her shoulder, like a guard or an advisor. She was neither, although where no one could see, Lexa began to teach her to fight. Now that she wasn't with her people, she didn't have access to bullets, and the ones that she had remaining were precious. If it came to a fight and she needed to defend herself, she couldn't just rely on her gun. She'd managed to hold her own – barely – when she'd fought Anya, but Anya had been weak, exhausted from blood loss and walking for miles, and she might not be so lucky in the future. 

At night, Clarke went to bed bruised and sore wondering if it was really worth it. But Lexa's hands on her skin, working the muscles to ease the ache, and then working in other ways to make her forget that she hurt at all, made her remember that yes, it was. It was very much worth it.

One night she lay with her head on Lexa's chest, listening to her heartbeat beneath her ear, its rhythm slowing as Lexa's breathing steadied. Clarke kept her eyes closed, just letting herself enjoy the moment, because the quiet never lasted, although they were unlikely to be disturbed tonight... she hoped. She hoped that every night. Because here in their bed (when had she started thinking of it as _their_ bed rather than just Lexa's?) she was safe. Or she felt safe, which was different from actually _being_ safe, but she didn't think that any of them were truly safe anywhere in this world, so it was the closest she was likely to come. The idea was aided and abetted by Lexa's fingers in her hair, combing through the mussed golden strands, and then lazily tracing down her spine and back up again. 

"If I didn't know better, I would think you're trying to seduce me," Clarke joked, in her own tongue because forcing her brain to function in another language right now felt impossible.

"I think I've already done that," Lexa replied. She spoke in Gonasleng, as they called it – warrior-language. Because only their warriors actually spoke the language of the Skaikru, and the Mountain Men before them. 

"Again," Clarke amended, conceding the point.

"Should I?" Lexa asked.

"No." Clarke wasn't sure that she would ever get her fill of Lexa, of her skin and the sound of her breathing as it caught in a gasp and exhaled in a moan, of the way that their bodies fit and moved against each other, but for tonight... tonight she'd had enough. 

"Mm." Lexa pulled the furs that served as blankets up over them, and Clarke knew without looking that she'd closed her eyes, her guard let down as she never did anywhere but here. 

Clarke knew that she ought to let Lexa sleep. That whatever tomorrow held, it would be more stressful for the Commander than it would be for her, because she had walked away from all of her own responsibilities, but Lexa hadn't. Wouldn't. Couldn't. Not that Clarke would ever ask her to. Being Heda was part of who Lexa was, a role that she believed that she had been born for. She would give it up only in death.

The thought made Clarke shiver. If something happened to Lexa, what would happen to her?

She turned her head, pressed her lips to Lexa's skin, felt her stir and tighten her arms around her. _I love you,_ she said, without saying a word. _It's okay. You're safe._

"Who am I to you?" Clarke asked. The words came out... not exactly unbidden, but without her really wanting them to, because if she asked, she would get an answer, and it might not be one that she truly wanted to hear. 

Lexa's arms tightened again, but she didn't answer the question. Clarke pushed herself up on her elbow to look down at her, and found that Lexa's eyes were full of tears, and she had not expected that. She wiped them away with the ball of her thumb as they leaked from the corner of Lexa's eyes. "I'm sorry," she whispered against her lips, kissing her to try to undo whatever she'd done. 

"No," Lexa replied. "You should not be sorry."

But she was. She hadn't meant to upset Lexa, just to try and give herself some context. She'd cut herself adrift from her people; shouldn't she be content to keep drifting? She shouldn't need some sort of label to reassure herself that this was real. 

"You are mine," Lexa said after a moment. "I am yours. I don't know any other way to say it."

"But am I..." Clarke frowned. What was she really asking? "Who do they think I am? Your people?"

Lexa tucked back a lock of Clarke's hair behind her ear, letting her fingers trace along her jaw. "That is easier and harder to answer," she said. "Many of them, they don't know what to make of you. They know who you are. They know what you've done. You are _Wanheda._ But what they think that makes you?" She shook her head. "Some of them may think that you are an advisor, an ally. Some of them may think that you are my second, because I keep you at my side and I teach you."

"Am I?" Clarke asked. "Your second?"

"No," Lexa said, in a tone that made it clear there was no arguing. "You are my equal. You always have been, and you always will be."

"But they don't see that."

"They do," Lexa said. "Some of them. Some do not like it. Some accept it. They cannot change it, in any case."

"They could," Clarke said. 

The words hung heavy between them, and Clarke could see in Lexa's eyes that she knew exactly what Clarke had meant by that, that she was remembering, and she cursed herself for tearing open that wound, which after... she didn't know how long, actually... still had not healed, no matter what Lexa said. Maybe it never would. Certainly it had left a scar, and that would never go away, although maybe it would eventually fade.

"I won't let that happen again," Lexa said. 

_You won't if you can help it,_ Clarke thought. _But if I am taken, and they say that it's my life or war against your people, which will you choose? One life, or the hundreds that might die in battle?_ Lexa - _Heda_ \- would always choose with her head, not her heart. If she was taken as a bargaining chip against Lexa, she knew that she would come second. Always.

But if she was faced with the same kind of choice... would she do any different? She had walked away physically, but where was her heart, really? With her friends, her family? Or here? 

Could it be both places at once? 

Could this really work, or were they deluding themselves? 

"Don't go," Lexa said, as if she could sense Clarke's thoughts. Or maybe she'd felt the tension in her body as the thought that maybe she ought to sleep in her own bed tonight had slid across her mind and not been instantly dismissed. "Please."

Which was _I love you_ all over again, and more than that. _I need you,_ maybe, or... Clarke didn't know, or wouldn't let herself admit. But she relaxed back against Lexa, let herself be held even as she knew neither of them would sleep now. 

"I'm sorry," she said again. "I didn't mean to upset you."

"I know," Lexa said. "You didn't mean to upset yourself, either, but here we are."

"Should we be doing this?" Clarke asked. "Is this real? Can it be?"

"It is real," Lexa told her. "You... sometimes I think you are the only real thing that I have. Everything else... it could be taken away. The peace that I've built, it takes only one clan deciding that they no longer want peace, that another clan has something that they want and will not share, so they are going to take it, and it all falls apart."

"I could be—"

Lexa shook her head, not letting Clarke say it out loud. "You could be, yes, but it wouldn't change what I feel. It would not change what you feel. You, here, now, at my side... it's what makes me want to keep the peace. It's what makes me keep working to keep this all together. It is for my people, yes, but it is also for me, and you, and us."

"Not only for me," Clarke said. "You made peace before you even knew I existed." 

"Not only," Lexa said, "but it drives me. You asked me, 'Shouldn't life be about more than just surviving? Don't we deserve better than that?'"

"And then you kissed me."

"Then I kissed you," Lexa agreed. "But you said not yet, and then I had to put my people first. When I found you, I thought maybe this was... fate. You fell to the earth, and of anywhere you could have landed, you fell _here_ , where I could meet you. Our people tried and failed to kill each other, and you brought with you when you came to me a wish for peace. Peace is all I have ever wanted. An end to the killing, and end to all of the death at each other's hands. I thought I had it, and then your people fell from the sky, but we found it again. And for the first time in a long time, I feel like maybe I can live. Maybe I can do more than just survive. But that feeling is all tangled up in you. I can't separate the two." She took Clarke's hand and placed it on her chest, pressing it there so that she could feel her pulse against her palm. " _Yu laik ain tombom,_ " she whispered.

Even if she hadn't taught Clarke the words, no translation was needed. _You are my heart._

" _Ai hod yu in seintaim,_ " Clarke replied. _I love you too._

They did sleep after all, and if Clarke was no closer to having a word to apply to just exactly who she was to Lexa, or who Lexa was to her, she was more resigned to it.

They might have carried on like that indefinitely, one day flowing into another, if not for the horns. The horns that had signaled acid fog, and called them to war. One day as they were sparring (which today seemed to focus on Clarke trying to dodge Lexa to avoid being knocked on her ass) the horns sounded, and Lexa immediately stopped, and Clarke narrowly missed a swing at her midsection as she almost failed to notice that Lexa had not, in fact, left herself wide open on purpose to see if Clarke would take the opportunity presented to her.

Lexa offered her a hand, tugging her to her feet and brushing her off, and let Clarke do the same. "Go to our room," she said.

"Like hell," Clarke replied, and she thought it would result in an argument but no, Lexa just looked at her for a long moment and then nodded, a quick jerk of her chin, and motioned for Clarke to follow.

She headed for the door that separated her domain from the rest of the city, and was met there by several guards. "What is happening?" she asked.

"Scouts," they said. "With a prisoner."

"From where?"

"The Sky People."

Clarke was sure she didn't imagine the tightening of Lexa's jaw. It matched the tension that sang through her own limbs. "Why?"

"We believe she is a spy." 

"We are not at war with the Sky People," Lexa said. "What reason do they have to spy on us?"

"We did not want to take a chance, _Heda_."

Lexa nodded, and turned to Clarke. "If I ask you to stay here, will you listen?" she asked, but the resignation in her voice told Clarke that she already knew the answer. When Clarke shook her head, Lexa sighed. "Come, then."

They went to the room where Lexa held court, for lack of a better term... and what other term was there for it, really? She had a _throne_ , which she sat on now, and Clarke stood on one side of it, and Indra took up a post on the other. 

"Bring her in," Lexa commanded.

The door opened, and two guards came through, pushing along someone between them. Clarke recognized her immediately, and it was all she could do not to rush over to her and throw her arms around her. But she stayed where she was, not daring to look at Lexa... or worse, Indra.

Her hands were bound, but she held herself upright, looking straight at Lexa as she approached. The guards stopped her several yards away, and might have tried to force her to her knees if Lexa hadn't held up a hand to stop them. "Octavia of the Sky People," she said. "My people believe you are a spy."

"Your people aren't very bright then," Octavia spat. "If I was a spy, I would have actually made some attempt to hide what I was doing."

"Why are you here then?" Lexa asked. 

"I come with a message," she said. "And a request."

Lexa's eyes flicked to the guards on either side of Octavia. "You have stripped her of her weapons?"

"Yes, _Heda_."

"Then you may go."

They looked ready to object, but she quelled them with a glance. They turned and left. 

"Approach," Lexa said, motioning for Octavia to come closer.

"Commander—" Indra hissed, but Lexa didn't let her get any farther than that. 

"She was your second," Lexa said. "You do not trust her now?"

"She turned her back on us," Indra said. "She could not follow orders. She chose the Sky People over _Trikru_."

"They are her people," Lexa said. "She did what she had to to protect them, just as you do to protect ours. It is not a crime, and I do not see any reason to treat her as a criminal. She is not a threat to me." She looked at Octavia. "Are you?"

"No."

"Good." Lexa pulled her dagger from its sheath, and for a split second Clarke's heart was in her throat as she imagined – remembered – what Lexa was capable of with the blade. But she only used it to cut Octavia's bonds. "What is your message?"

"It's not actually for you," Octavia said. "I came to speak to _Wanheda_."

Clarke stepped forward, out of the shadow she had been, perhaps, trying to hide herself in. She'd thought that maybe Octavia hadn't seen her, or hadn't recognized her, but of course she should have known better. Octavia was smart, and observant, and despite the fact that she had chosen their people over the Grounders, she hadn't lost all ties. She was with Lincoln, and although Lincoln was exiled, banished for his siding with the Sky People, she couldn't imagine that every one of Lexa's people obeyed that edict, and she was sure that Lexa didn't enforce it too strictly. After all, she had used knowledge that surely came from him for her own benefit, hadn't she?

"Clarke," Octavia said, and maybe she imagined the catch in the other girl's voice, or maybe she didn't. "I was glad to hear that you are alive."

"I'm glad to see that you are as well," Clarke said.

There was silence, and Clarke could sense Lexa's growing impatience, because clearly that wasn't all that Octavia had come to say. 

"What is your message?" Clarke asked, trying to find the same formal, impassive tone that Lexa used and failing. She just couldn't put that kind of distance between herself and everything that Octavia represented. 

"You need to come home."

Clarke swallowed, her mouth suddenly dry. She should have known that that's what the message would be, that when someone came looking and finally found her, that's what they would say. And it was the one thing that she couldn't do... and not only because she still wasn't sure she was ready to face the looks of the people that she'd saved (at what cost?) but also because the word didn't mean the same thing anymore.

Maybe she glanced at Lexa. Maybe Lexa looked at her. Maybe they didn't need to do either; maybe her presence here was enough, or maybe people talked more than she knew. Whatever it was, Octavia's eyes shifted from her to Lexa and back again.

"You need to come _back_ ," she said. The change in the wording was deliberate, and meaningful, and if anyone understood how one's heart could be torn between two places, or two concepts of home, it was Octavia. She had Bellamy on one side and Lincoln on the other, and... She understood, and she didn't have to say a word for Clarke to know that she did. "We need you to come back."

"Who is we?" Clarke asked.

"Your family," Octavia said. "Your friends. Those of us who want peace."

"What is happening?" Lexa asked. Clarke saw her glance over at Indra, who was quiet, but of course she was listening, taking it all in. She didn't know what either woman was thinking, but it didn't matter. She would trust Lexa's trust in Indra. After all, Indra had chosen Octavia as her second once, and had free Lincoln so that he could come to the aid of her people, so her hatred of the Sky People couldn't be as entire as she sometimes made it out to be.

"There are those among the Sky People who feel that, now that we're here, that this land should be ours. That we have the right to take it, by whatever means necessary. And there are those of us who feel differently. We are here. We're not going anywhere, because we have nowhere else to go. But taking things by force... didn't they learn anything from the last time?"

The last time, Clarke knew, meaning the war that had led to the destruction of all life on earth... or so they'd believed. But there were many times before that, too, if you paid any attention in history class at all. 

"You think that Clarke can stop that?" Lexa asked. "You think that she can change their minds?"

"I don't know," Octavia said. "Maybe. People listened to her before, and we all owe her our lives."

"Lives that will be forfeit if you move against us," Indra said, finally speaking. "The goodwill that Clarke has earned by destroying the Mountain Men will not last forever. The minute one of your people takes the life of one of our people, _jus drein, jus daun._ "

_Blood will have blood._

"They have to know they can't win," Clarke said. "They have to know that they are outnumbered."

"They have guns," Octavia said. 

"But we know this land better than they ever will," Indra said. "They will not see us coming until we have our blades to their throats."

Octavia hesitated, then said more quietly, "They're not alone."

Silence. And then in a tone that made Clarke's insides cold, Lexa hissed, "Explain."

"Some of them – the smarter ones – have realized that not all Grounders are the same. They've figured out that the coalition between the clans isn't popular with everyone. That there are... chinks in the armor, I guess. And... they've been talking."

"To who?"

"To people who don't think that you are the right person to lead," Octavia said, and Clarke admired the fact that she looked Lexa directly in the eye when she said it. "By people who think that you are too weak to lead."

"Who?" Lexa demanded, her hands tightening, and Clarke wanted to reach out and take them, uncurl the fingers that were forming fists. Not because she thought that Lexa would do anything to Octavia – she was smart enough not to shoot the messenger, so to speak – but just because she didn't like seeing her like this. She had seen too much of the girl behind the mask to want her to have to put it fully back in place. 

" _Azgeda,_ " Octavia said.

Lexa's eyes closed, then opened again, a slow, too-long blink. A moment to regain her composure, perhaps, or an acknowledgment, her version of a nod. She didn't seem surprised. 

"How soon do you need to get back?" Clarke asked.

"Soon," Octavia said.

"Is Lincoln with you?"

"He didn't come close enough to get caught."

Clarke nodded. "Will you wait? Not long, but... I need to think."

"Yes," Octavia said, and she was looking back and forth between Lexa and Clarke, and Clarke was pretty sure that she saw right through them, and was surprised, or maybe relieved, to find that she didn't care. Maybe it was better. Maybe she would understand whatever decision Clarke made.

"Indra will take you to get something to eat," Lexa said, ignoring the way that Indra bristled at the suggestion, but she didn't argue. She stepped down, reaching out as if to take Octavia (probably not gently) by the arm. 

Octavia sidestepped, avoiding the touch. "There's one more thing, Clarke," she said. "The person they've been talking to? The one that's been listening?" She looked down, then back up, and her jaw was set in the way that happened when you were fighting back tears, or rage, or both. "Is Bellamy."

**Author's Note:**

> I'm going to try to wrap this up as much as I can before the premiere of season 3, where all of my speculation will certainly get hosed. Goal is to post next Thursday and the Thursday after.
> 
> Also, I recently started posted a Clexa modern AU story: [Where There is a Flame](http://archiveofourown.org/works/5474192/chapters/12650540). It posts twice a week, so check it out if that's your thing!


End file.
